Adobe Spark, a Visual Learning Tool
Adobe Spark is a visual learning tool that allows you to create story-board like videos and slideshows from a web-based program.on any device. It’s easy to use, allowing users of all skill levels to create a product. I created this Adobe Spark presentation to offer my students a quick review over the characteristics we have been studying for polynomial graphing. It includes standards, learning targets, and reviews end behavior, positive & negative intervals, absolute & relative minimums & maximums, intervals of increase & decrease, zeros and multiplicities. My students enjoyed the review video, but they did have some feedback for me. They suggested that I use video snips, instead of the images, to highlight the vocabulary terms. I agree with this idea, because I ended up having to describe each term with a motionless picture, but I also think that Screencastify might be a better tool for that. Perhaps, I should have thought of a different topic for my Spark Video.
Graphing Polynomial Review- Spark Video
Graphing Polynomial Review- Spark Video
More Productivity Tools - Chrome Extensions & Add-ons
I explored a few new tools this week, and I think you will enjoy them too. Dayboard & Write-on-Web are chrome extensions. Dayboard is useful for keeping on task, while Write-on-Web is a tool to help you .... I also looked at some of Alice Keeler's templates for Google Tools. Alice Keeler is a great code-writer and has some awesome Google tricks and tips for everyone. I explored Group-Maker, Spiral Review, and Let's Make a Form.
DayboardHow many times have you opened Google Chrome, intending on working on something important, maybe an assignment that's due, or a task to complete? How many times have you let something distract you, perhaps social media or shopping, so that your intended task did not get accomplished as desired? If this happens to you, Dayboard could be a time-saver. |
Dayboard is a “new tab” checklist and website blocker that “helps you improve focus, reduce distractions, and fight procrastination.” Dayboard asks you to identify five tasks or items to focus on. Throughout the day, as you open new tabs, Dayboard will remind you of your checklist. It also has a built-in site-blocker, but in a unique way. You can set it to allow you to visit those distracting sites and to limit your time on them. For example, you can allow yourself 10 mins of Twitter or YouTube time, and Dayboard will block the site after you have used it up. This helps you avoid procrastination and stay focused.
Ilovepdf.com
Ilovepdf.com is an online pdf files converter tool that is integrated with Google Drive and Dropbox, and also has a mobile app and desktop version. I added this Chrome Extension to see if it could really convert word to pdf and vice versa. As a Math teacher, there have been many times that I looked for practice worksheets for my students online. Sometimes, you find something great, but most of the time, I want to be able to edit and change the pdf files I find so I can create something different. I need a true pdf convertor that can accomplish the task quickly so I can offer my students practice, assessments, and feedback with ease. To test the extension, first, I converted a word document to pdf- because I know that I can save a document as pdf on my computer, but this program should be able to as well. It’s version was nice and clean, as expected. Next, I used a practice that I shared as a pdf as part of sub plans last week. I wanted to see if it would convert it back to the word version. It did convert it, although not perfectly formatted as the original, it would have only required minor changes to fix. You can see the results from my endeavors through the files below, but overall, I believe the extension is useful for converting documents.
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Alice Keeler's Google Add-Ons
Group-Maker
Group Maker, by Alice Keeler is a Google Sheets add-on that allows you to add your roster of students and then randomly create groups for differentiation, tasks, etc. It was very easy to use, and you create several sheets to group by levels if needed. I tried it out here and I think I will use this to create random project groups this week. It's quick and easy- you just just paste your roster in, select the group size, and click start. For more information, click here.
Let's Make a Form
This add-on allows you to easily turn a Google Sheets into a Form. This can be useful for creating a quick assessment over homework, or practice, or even a survey. The add-on creates the form for you, but then you would still need to review the settings in Google Forms. Here's a link to the sheet I created, and the form.
Spiral Review
Spiral Review is a new way to provide 5 quick review questions for your students to review. You simply use the sheets template to create your questions, as many as you want. The add-on will automatically cycle 5 new questions every hour into its Google Slides for students to review. One idea would be to add new questions for each unit throughout the semester to use as a cumulative review. For next semester, you could simply move the extra questions to a second sheet so that students only review what they have learned. Here’s a quick link to my spiral review, and to the resulting Google Slides. The only issue I encountered was that I wasn't able to add graphics, images, or equations to the sheet cells. In secondary math, it's rather difficult for one to create a problem, other than a DOK 1, without an image or equation. For now, I think I'll try to use the spiral review for vocabulary, recall, and easy to create math problems. Check out this blog posting by Alice Keeler, creator of Spiral Review, for more information. Here’s the step-by-step guide for How to Automagically Create a Spiral Warmup.
Productivity Tools can be very useful. There are so many extensions and add-ons to try, one just needs to dive in and try some.
Group Maker, by Alice Keeler is a Google Sheets add-on that allows you to add your roster of students and then randomly create groups for differentiation, tasks, etc. It was very easy to use, and you create several sheets to group by levels if needed. I tried it out here and I think I will use this to create random project groups this week. It's quick and easy- you just just paste your roster in, select the group size, and click start. For more information, click here.
Let's Make a Form
This add-on allows you to easily turn a Google Sheets into a Form. This can be useful for creating a quick assessment over homework, or practice, or even a survey. The add-on creates the form for you, but then you would still need to review the settings in Google Forms. Here's a link to the sheet I created, and the form.
Spiral Review
Spiral Review is a new way to provide 5 quick review questions for your students to review. You simply use the sheets template to create your questions, as many as you want. The add-on will automatically cycle 5 new questions every hour into its Google Slides for students to review. One idea would be to add new questions for each unit throughout the semester to use as a cumulative review. For next semester, you could simply move the extra questions to a second sheet so that students only review what they have learned. Here’s a quick link to my spiral review, and to the resulting Google Slides. The only issue I encountered was that I wasn't able to add graphics, images, or equations to the sheet cells. In secondary math, it's rather difficult for one to create a problem, other than a DOK 1, without an image or equation. For now, I think I'll try to use the spiral review for vocabulary, recall, and easy to create math problems. Check out this blog posting by Alice Keeler, creator of Spiral Review, for more information. Here’s the step-by-step guide for How to Automagically Create a Spiral Warmup.
Productivity Tools can be very useful. There are so many extensions and add-ons to try, one just needs to dive in and try some.